Platts - Monday, March 22, 2004 http://www.platts.com ------------ Honeywell still targeting early April plant restart Washington (Platts)--19Mar2004 Honeywell is still targeting early April for a return to full production at its Metropolis, Ill. uranium conversion facility. Robert Donohoe, a spokesman for Honeywell Specialty Materials said today that, under the best-case scenario, the plant could begin the restart process as early as next week and be producing uranium hexafluoride (UF6) by the first week in April. However, he emphasized that there is "no official startup date." Honeywell met with NRC last night in Metropolis to discuss the company's progress in upgrading equipment, procedures, and practices since a UF6 leak that shut down the plant Dec. 22. NRC spokesman Roger Hannah said there were several "unknowns" in the timetable for the completion of Honeywell's outstanding pre-startup tasks and that it was difficult to estimate a time for return to production that was more specific than "several weeks" from now. ------------ House panel to discuss waste program bill Washington (Platts)--19Mar2004 Legislation changing the way funding for the DOE nuclear waste program is handled will be the subject of a House Energy & Commerce subcommittee hearing March 25. The bill (H.R. 3981), which full committee Chairman Joe Barton (R-Texas) introduced March 17, was first presented to Capitol Hill in late February by the administration as draft legislation. Barton introduced that legislation unchanged. The bill would reclassify fees paid into the Nuclear Waste Fund as offsetting collections, treating that money as user fees that could only be spent on the DOE waste program. Congress set up the waste fund, a federal trust fund, in 1983 to bankroll the disposal of utility spent fuel. The subcommittee hearing will be at 9:30 a.m. in the Rayburn House Office Building, room 2123. ------------ Panel says Pickering-1 refurbishment should proceed Ottawa (Platts)--18Mar2004 Plans to refurbish Pickering-1 should go forward, according to a government-appointed committee that prepared a report on Ontario Power Generation's future. The panel recommended that the unit, one of four Pickering A reactors that were mothballed in 1998, should be returned by next year at a cost of (Cdn)$600- million. Unit 4 at the Pickering A station was restarted in September 2003, following cost overruns and schedule delays. The panel recommended that the unit 1 project proceed with a comprehensive management approach and stringent oversight. ------------ Nuclear outages lowered OPG production Ottawa (Platts)--17Mar2004 Outages at Darlington and Pickering contributed to a decline in production in 2003, Ontario Power Generation (OPG) said. Production of 109.1 terawatt-hours (TWH) was 6.7 TWH lower than in 2002. OPG reported a 2003 net loss of (Cdn)$491-million after a $473-million writedown on its coal-fired generating stations, which are slated for closure in 2007. Excluding the one-time item, the loss was $18-million. In 2002, OPG had net income of $67- million. ------------ Nevada again sues DOE over Yucca Mt. Washington (Platts)--17Mar2004 Nevada sued Energy Secretary Spencer Abraham and DOE in federal court today, the latest in a series of lawsuits the state has filed in an effort to stop the nuclear waste repository project at Yucca Mountain, Nev. The suit claims DOE broke the law by not providing adequate funds for state and local government oversight of the repository program at Yucca Mountain. In its petition, Nevada asked the U.S. Court of Appeals in Washington, D.C. to suspend all licensing activities associated with the Yucca Mountain project until Abraham complies with the law and to direct the department to issue the necessary funds. "This fiscal year, DOE reduced Nevada's oversight grant from $5-million to only $1-million, at a time when our scientific and technical experts are preparing critical studies to aid the NRC in its safety evaluation," Nevada Attorney General Brian Sandoval said in announcing the lawsuit. DOE intends to submit a repository license application to NRC in December. ------------ Davis-Besse is temporarily reconnected to grid Washington (Platts)--16Mar2004 Davis-Besse reconnected to the grid at 5:30 a.m. but its generation will soon be interrupted again, Richard Wilkins, a spokesman for operator FirstEnergy Nuclear Operating Co. (Fenoc) told Platts today. He said the 925-MW PWR was up to about 20% power but that plant personnel discovered last night that valves needed to be repaired on the main feedwater line to one of the unit's steam generators. He estimated that the repair, which requires shutting down the reactor, would take "several days." But he said the reactor would have had to go off- line--though perhaps not to zero power--in any case when Fenoc performed a turbine trip test as part of its restart procedure. Wilkins said Fenoc had not yet decided whether to carry out the valve repair, bring the unit back on line, and do the turbine trip test later, or perform the two actions simultaneously. Another factor in the unit's down time, Wilkins said, would be other "emergent issues" Fenoc discovers as it powers up the reactor after a two-year shutdown. ------------ Hatch-1 returns; Farley-2 begins refueling Washington (Platts)--15Mar2004 Hatch-1 returned from refueling yesterday, and Farley-2 began a refueling outage March 13. Both units are operated by Southern Nuclear Operating Co. The Hatch-1 outage involved routine refueling and maintenance activities, and similar work is planned for the Farley-2 outage. Hatch-1 shut down Feb. 14; it was at 21% power earlier today. ------------